District Central Office Transformation for Teaching & Learning Improvement What ’ s the core?

1. District Central Office Transformation for Teaching & Learning Improvement What’s the core? Meredith I. Honig Associate Professor & Co-Principal Investigator CEL Central Office Transformation Symposium June 2, 2011

2. Outline • Starting points • What’s the core? • Learning-focused partnerships with principals focused on instructional leadership • Other units providing high- quality, relevant services that support instruction • Leaders continuously teaching the work • Next steps?

3. Starting Points • Central offices matter, but mostly frustrate improvement • A predictable result: Central offices set up for different work • Invest in the central office to improve schools

4. Our Study • Qualitative, comparative case study (2007-2008) • Atlanta; New York City-ESO; Oakland Unified, CA • Data Sources • Interviews: 282 • Observations: 264.5 hours • Documents: 252 • Linking Practices/Activities & Outcomes - Are they practices that learning theory shows: • Improve others’ practice • Increase system capacity to support others’ practice - Are they confirmed by multiple data sources? • Observed improvements • Multiple reports of improvements

5. Findings: 5 Dimensions of Central Office Transformation 1. Learning-focused partnerships with school principals 2. Assistance to the central office-principal partnerships 3. Reorganizing and re-culturing each central office unit to support the partnerships and teaching & learning improvement 4. Stewardship of the overall central office transformation process 5. Evidence use throughout the central office to support continual improvement of work practices

6. It’s not central office transformation without… #1 Learning-focused partnerships between central office staff and principals dedicated to improving principals’ instructional leadership

7. #1 Learning-focused Partnerships Before… • Assistant/Area Superintendents • “Sit-and-get” PD for principals • Occasional principal coaching • Central office-principal relationship: Focused on compliance After Instructional Leadership Directors

8. Focus on Principals’ Instructional Leadership ILD: “I… spend time… helping principals focus their work. Working on the quality of teaching and learning. Looking at student work. Looking at the rigor. Looking at best practices…. Taking a principal who has not spent time in classrooms and getting them to shift their focus takes a lot of…intentional work. And then [helping them] maintain that focus in a culture where teachers are used to… keeping you in your office to deal with this one student all day– that’s a whole other level of work. And then helping [principals] prioritize their time…on the core….”

9. Learning-focused Partnerships

10. The Core of Transformation: Learning-focused Partnerships Before… • Assistant/Area Superintendents • “Sit-and-get” PD for principals • Occasional principal coaching • Central office-principal relationship: Focused on compliance After Instr. Leadership Directors: • Providing intensive, job-embedded PD • Engaging in practices of master teachers

11. Focusing in instructional leadership as joint or shared work Differentiating supports… Modeling… Developing & using “tools”… Brokering resources… Specific Practices In support of: Principals’ Instructional Leadership

12. The Core of Transformation: Learning-focused Partnerships Before… • Assistant/Area Superintendents • “Sit-and-get” PD for principals • Occasional principal coaching • Central office-principal relationship: Focused on compliance After Instr. Leadership Directors: • Providing intensive, job-embedded PD • Engaging in practices of master teachers • Receiving ongoing support

13. Professional Development for ILDs is Essential Central office director of elementary schools: “I have been in a building for 30 years and building principal for 20. When I was principal I regularly complained that central office staff were never in my building. I have been at this job for three years but I am hardly ever in buildings myself. I don’t know what to do when I’m there to help.”

14. Protecting ILDs’ Time Instructional Leadership Director: “We had black out days, right, and the blackout days were equivalent to one and a half days a week [later increased to two and a half days]. And the blackout days mean that you don’t pull principals, you don’t pull… [ILDs] because people are in schools doing the work.”

15. FAQs about the Partnerships • Can’t our Area Superintendents just do this? • Can’t we go with a hybrid where staff do this, say, 40% of the time and other things for the other 60? • I don’t have funding or time to staff this group; can they facilitate and support themselves?

16. Check-In • What are 1-2 ideas about the learning-focused partnerships that are resonating with you? Why those? • What are 1-2 ideas that are not resonating or that are confusing? What questions will you ask to deepen your understanding?

17. It’s not central office transformation without… #2 Shifting everyone’s work so that all staff provide high-quality, relevant services in support of improved instruction. Project Management Performance Management Case Management

18. #2 Shifting everyone’s work… Case Management

19. Case Management in Human Resources HR “Before” • Which applications are on my desk? • Have I moved the names of those candidates onto the list in time? • Have I processed the paperwork for the candidates principals want to hire? HR “After” • Who are my principals? • What are their goals? • What are they like to work for? • What kind of candidates do they want and might work well there? • How can I help them recruit, hire, and retain?

20. Case Management in Instructional Services C & I (“Before”) • Administers programs largely based on funding • Deploys coaches centrally by school performance • Staffs up alignment work Instructional Services (“After”) • Staff continuously strategically develop actual instructional servicesbased on: • Input from principals and ILDs • School demand • Research/expertise • ILDs-Principals draw on services to support professional learning goals

21. #2 Shifting everyone’s work… Case Management Project Management

22. #2 Shifting everyone’s work… Performance Management Case Management Project Management

23. FAQs about shifting everyone’s work 1. How can we add services given our budget constraints? We just can’t take on anything else! 2. Can we do this with our existing staff? 3. How do we do this without staff feeling like their jobs are at risk?

24. It’s not central office transformation without… #3 Leading by teaching: “Instructional leadership” throughout the central office

25. Executive Leadership as Instructional Leadership • Continuously develop and communicate a vision focused on teaching and learning • Teach everyone how to change– including how to lead the change • Have and use a theory of action • Clarifies the “through line” • Articulates the what and the why • Tracks ongoing learning • Approach all that you do as a teaching (not a telling) opportunity

26. The Core Ideas • Learning-focused partnerships • Shifting everyone’s work • Case management • Project management • Performance management • Leading by teaching